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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29889915">Sansa as Elisabeth I</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Minita/pseuds/Minita'>Minita</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Game of Thrones (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>ASOIAF meta, F/M, Jonsa meta</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 17:14:35</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,058</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29889915</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Minita/pseuds/Minita</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>This is mostly my ramblings on the parallels between Sansa and Elisabeth. I will hint at Jonsa just a little at the end. I assume the show ending is canon but I mention book elements the show left out.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Jon Snow/Sansa Stark</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>33</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Sansa as Elisabeth I</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>Sansa as Elisabeth I</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>The finale showed Sansa as an “Elisabeth Tudor”, powerful and triumphant but alone. The parallels as written by GRRM are pretty obvious:</p><p> </p>
<ol>
<li>Elisabeth: An orphan. Her mother beheaded. Sansa: An orphan. Father beheaded.</li>
<li>Elisabeth: A bastard, erased of the line of succession by her own brother, the child King Edward. Her cousin Jane Grey is set to strip her and Mary of their birthrights and is actually crowned. Sansa being a bastard in the Vale, stripped of her birthright by her own brother, the young King in the North. The crown will be worn by her cousin Jon before her.</li>
<li>Elisabeth: the younger, more beautiful Queen for her bitter, old and sickly half sister that didn’t trust her at all. A dynamic that has Cersei and Sansa written all over it.</li>
<li>Elisabeth: The symbol and centre of courtly love. Gloriana, inspiration for artists, patron of the arts, of William Shakespeare, loved dancing. Sansa: inspires songs (Marillion), inspires knights (Dontos). Sansa has the most imagery and associations with tourneys and with stories (plays).</li>
<li>Elisabeth was a prodigious embroiderer and took extreme care on her appearance, hair and dresses. Sansa being Sansa.</li>
<li>Elisabeth was courted by many for her claim, specially after Mary’s infertility became public knowledge, and during her reign still well into her old age. Extremely shrewd and clever, even as a teenager she knew how to play the game and never tangled herself with shady characters like Lord Seymour. ( A stand in for Littlefinger btw, complete with molesting his wife’s ward, a teen Elisabeth, while being married to Catherine Parr, a mother figure to her. Hello Aunt Lysa! ). Sansa: all of the above.</li>
<li>Elisabeth’s entire life is connected to a symbolic, (and by all accounts, physical too) maidenhood. Sansa: do I need to say more?</li>
<li>Elisabeth ended the religious wars, straightened the finances of her humble kingdom and started an age of splendour for her people, turned it into a first class power, complete with explorers that extended her influence beyond her borders onto the sea. (Hello, Arya!) Sansa: Dream of Spring.</li>
<li>And last but not least, redheaded. In a famous anecdote, an assassin sent against Elisabeth is unable to kill her, stating that she looked “so much like her father the King” that he couldn’t do it. And whose hair (like her mother’s) will probably be the thing that will save her? Yeah. Sansa.</li>
</ol><p> </p><p>Bonus: Raised as a Protestant, Elisabeth was known to follow Catholic traditions when she lived in her sister’s court (probably out of fear, frankly) but in general she was pretty open to both faiths, a more conciliatory attitude than her predecesors. Sansa follows the seven but specially so while in Cersei’s court. She is becoming more and more interested in the Old Gods as her story progresses, but does not seem inclined to religious crusades like Stannis, for instance.</p><p> </p><p>Now, I know that GRRM loves the War of the Roses, and it’s pretty clear to me Sansa has characteristics both from Elisabeth of York and Elisabeth Tudor, while both Cersei and Daenerys share traits of Mary Tudor (Bloody Mary). However, he is writing his story with some twists and turns that send it in a very different direction, and Sansa’s arch is no exception.</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>Why Sansa’s ending is bad and not badass.</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>The reason the show’s ending for Sansa feels like an empowering declaration of “Sansa is so strong she doesn’t need a man” is because we are looking at it with our 21 century eyes. Five hundreds years ago, Elisabeth’s life of celibacy was for her contemporaries quite shocking and worrying. </p><p>Towards the end of her reign, Elisabeth was celebrated, and her country prospered, therefore, her people had come to accept her uniqueness, and her perpetual maidenhood was oddly, almost a matter of national pride. But it wasn’t such at the beginning. In fact, her decision to stay single caused great consternation amongst her councillors, and it wasn’t because of anti feminism, just for survival. </p><p>At the end of the day, monarchy is the idea of birthright, and having no heirs meant no continuity. No continuity meant war, and suffering for the common folk. Her father’s life obsession had been a male heir, an obsession her mother paid with her head, and the same obsession had destroyed her sister’s life. Regardless of her personal trauma, Elisabeth knew that after her death the country would tear itself apart if she died childless, and it was only her extraordinary self confidence that allowed her to pull this out, that and the fact she had a nephew that ticked all the right boxes.</p><p> </p><p>Elisabeth was an exception, not the rule.</p><p> </p><p>No other English ruler, before or after her, refused to marry and make heirs. True, some failed at it, but not for the lack of trying.</p><p> </p><p>As the show ends, Sansa does not have any heir, or in fact, even a nephew to rely on. Now, this is pure speculation, of course, but I don’t think GRRM intends for the Starks to disappear by the end of ASOIAF. No matter how prosperous the North becomes under her reign, chaos will ensure if she dies childless, and more importantly, everything they suffered would have been for nothing.</p><p> </p><p>So, if GRRM indeed intends to keep Bran and Arya away of the North, the logical heir is Jon, but it seems odd to make him King, then make him a pariah, just to make him return to wear the crown again. Don’t you agree? A potential explanation is that he is not really an exile at the end of the series, nor is he bounded by NW’s vows anymore. This implies the show’s ending is incomplete, as if we were shown only one side of it, but not the whole thing. This can also apply to Sansa’s ending. If this is so, then at least the Stark line has a chance at continuity, through Sansa’s children or Jon’s children.</p><p> </p><p>
  <b>Can you trust his sons? Or theirs? Catelyn V. ASOS</b>
</p><p> </p><p>As a Jonsa, you know how I think this will go. GRRM will not pull an Elisabeth Tudor for Sansa,<b> no one will ever marry me for love</b> will in fact prove to be false, and Catelyn’s fear of Jon’s grandchildren competing with hers will prove null. Because they will be the same children.</p>
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